The War of the Fallen Flowers
by Fatalistic Cutie
Summary: Lily runs across England, struggling to survive. Witches come and go, but loan sharks less so. But the newest locale has more than a few unpleasant surprises waiting for her.
1. The Rose with too many thorns

Lily had been running, all her life, really. Lots and lots of running. Running from pricks who made fun of her at school, running from her family, to running from the loan sharks demanding she pay them and make up for the debt her family had racked up. Lily had never bothered to check how much money she was supposed to be paying back, but those buggers were persistent enough that she figured she'd spend her life in a whorehouse paying it off. Fuck _that_. But it was while she was running, traveling all across the ass end of England, that she discovered a strange white creature that started talking to her…..

Lily opened her eyes. She'd been daydreaming. Ugh. Any form of dreaming was unpleasant to her. She'd become familiar with blacking out upon touching a sofa and waking up several hours later. More often than not she didn't feel better when she woke up. "Fuck me", she muttered, as she perked herr head up. She was on a rooftop, too. She shouldn't have been dozing off. At this height, a fall would be fatal for most people, and she'd have to expend way too much magic to heal herself. Bloody hell….

_You know, if you decided to expend enough magic, you wouldn't have to sleep_. There it was. The white icing and pink cherry on the top of her chocolate shit cake. "Incubator" she growled "what the fuck do you want?"He might have actually been tolerable, once upon a time…..oh, who was she kidding, from the moment she met him he was an intolerable asshole.

_You are searching for prey currently, correct?_ "Yeah, what else would I be out here in the middle of the goddamn night for? No, I'm just doing a late night re-enactment of Romeo and Juliet, sorry". _Your words are layered with complex irony. Not that any less was expected. However, I have detected a witch that you failed to notice, as you had cut yourself off from the world for a lengthy piece of time_.

That got her attention. "Alright, scumbag, where is it?" _Perhaps you are more exhausted than usual. I see no other explanation for missing that which is right in front of you. _Lily turned. The damn thing could've been a block away and she could've sensed it. The barrier being as close as it was, was practically a sensory overload. Goddammit, why did she have to have daydreamed right now?

Lily rose to her feet, letting her regalia flow freely. Her outfit consisted of a large dress, which trailed so far down her legs it could be mistaken for a ballroom dress. It was large enough to mostly hide her white stockings and ruby red heels. Not that anyone could ever make out where they darted and ended, let alone realize they were stockings, since they blended in perfectly with the white dress. But some of her legs could still be seen, since the dress parted at the knees.

The dress was white, and thanks to it having a corset like nature with drawn strings that a bit of skin in a chest window, it was tight too. It was sleeveless on the left arm, but to make up for _that_ Lily had a band of red cloth just above her elbow, and a red fingerless silk glove on her left hand. The single white sleeve went down her right arm until shrank at the hand, latching onto her middle finger. To top her outfit off, there were red flowers strewn from her right shoulder to her left hip, with her red Soul Gem in the middle, in between her chest and the flowers, and her belly button.

It was a bit too elegant for Lily's taste. She always felt like she had just won a pageant. Ironic, since a pageant could probably get her enough money to pay off the loan sharks. But Lily put up with it, since there was no headpiece or anything to inhibit her from letting loose her dirty blonde hair, a descriptor that was all too often a literal one.

Lily stretched a hand out, and pulled her weapon into reality. It was a large mace, with a green handle and ball, with a red pommel and a red stripe that started at the pommel and spirals around the handle until it reached the ball, where it spread out along the ball as red spikes. It was a heavy, powerful, unrestrained tool of demolition, and it's contrast to the fragility, purity, and innocence of her costume always amused Lily. The weapon evoked the image of a rose, with thorns that would do a lot more than prick you if you weren't careful. Lily herself evoked the image of a rose, but she's be damned if she didn't have much more than her fair share of thorns.

Having summoned her weapon, Lily opened a portal with a flick of her wrist, and stepped through into the alley below. She touched the edge of the barrier, and reality spiraled in a mix of color as she stepped through, finding herself in a hallway, filled with passageways. Each had signs above them, filled with meaningless text scribbled on. "Go north for 50 seconds" said a sign that was carved in an X formation, with arrows at each end. "Insanity is common where we come from," said another. "Do not listen to the pies, for they speak only falsehoods". "The White Rabbit scampers around, and comes and goes where he pleases. Attack him on sight, for he brings nought but pain and misery". "The end is nigh, but the beginning is mourn". One way had no sign at it's entrance, standing there as nothing but a void in contrast to it's neighbors.

Lily sighed. This one was probably going to be a slog. She chose the tunnel with no sign, and proceeded. As she traveled, the amount of passageways she came across seemed to multiply exponentially. All the while, ancient runes literally ran across the walls, laughing at seemingly nothing, accompanied by a ruckus of sounds that seemed as if a whole orchestra had experienced a mass stroke. But the worst part were the paintings. Those goddamn paintings.

Every time Lily opened a door or went down a passageway, there would be paintings. One would have her in a certain scenario from her past. The next would depict the actions she took in that scenario. But the others all depicted what Lily could only assume were alternate outcomes, possibilities and probabilities of things that could and might have happened. Some had her captured by the sharks, paying off her debt. Some had her living a life with her family, some happy, others unhappy. Some had her selling her body. Some of the tunnels subjected her to the actions she took in past battles. Many of the paintings she passed by had her dead in various ways. Shot in this one, slashed to pieces in that one, tied up, dissolved, and consumed by a monstrous witch in the next.

Lily was beginning to get frustrated. Too many bad memories, and she wasn't making much progress in the labyrinth. Dammit there had to be some way to find out which way she was supposed to be going…..Almost absentmindedly, Lily opened a door ahead of her. She found nothing but a mass of familiars. Each resembled the Incubator, except if everything after his head was replaced with a centipedal, wormlike body. Lily almost screamed, before she started swinging her way through the horde.

If the horde was supposed to be a threat, it didn't seem like it. They were disorganized, predictable, and Lily batted them away and mashed them to pieces with ease. It probably helped that in choosing to resemble the Incubator, Lily achieved a sort of anger-driven catharsis in killing them. So much so that she looked around, saw nothing crawling towards her, and relaxed, lowering her stance, only to feel one left, crawling up her hair and planting itself atop her skull. Lily raised her hand to swat it off, but her vision went blurry…..


	2. The only thing you have to fear

_You see Lily, I can grant you a wish_, the creature purred. _In exchange, you will become a magical girl, and you will fight witches in order to give hope to all! _

"Pass" Lily said, her attention clearly elsewhere. You never know when one of those scumbags could try to ambush you…..

_I don't quite think you understand what I know, and what I have to offer. I can grant you any one wish, including one that can help you with your current ...problems_.

That got Lily's attention. "Ok…..Any wish I choose?" _Of course! You have enough potential in you, so I have no doubt you could make your wish come true._

Lily decided it was better not to ask what that meant. _Then w__hat shall you wish for? _"I wish...for the ability to escape my problems!" Lily almost shouted it, she wanted it so badly. _Very well. Your wish shall be granted! _

Lily began to rise into the air, with her chest and midsection taking the most of her body's weight, as her vision brightened and she felt a pain in her chest, as if her heart was being torn out. _Already starting to regret this…._ Lily thought, as her vision blurred…..

...

Lily awoke, splayed on the ground, back in the labyrinth. As she slowly rose, she gazed around dizzily and noticed the familiar had detached itself. It gave a small hiss before crawling away. _God shit fuck aaaaaa god bless the fuckin' queen that wasn't fun….._

Lily gathered herself together and collected herself once more. No visible sign of injury, although her skull had a faint ringing in it. But when Lily exited the room and went back to the infinite maze, she saw that there were now only two doors to go through. Each had a sign above it. "Face your fears" read the one on the left. "Face yourself" on the right.

Lily furrowed her brow. _A real mindfuck, this one_. The question was, which was worse?

"Fuck this" Lily said. "Fuck you, Incubator, Fuck you witch, fuck all this shit, and most of all, fuck me". She quickly eenie meenie minie mo'ed and went through the door on the left. This time the tunnel was wide, the widest one she'd gone through. There were no more runes, no more pictures, no more strange tunes. In their place, familiars crawled the walls, but they paid little attention to Lily, and she in turn decided it was probably best for now to leave them alone too.

The tunnel seemed to span on forever, until Lily found herself in an enclave, and there she spotted it: the witch. It took the form of a giant mirror, with six arms and hands sprouted outside of it's back. The two highest ones clung to the ceiling, while the bottom two were rooted in the ground. The middle set held objects, with the right hand holding a giant set of scissors, cutting into the wall, while the left hand was rock-like, and clenched a misshapen bell.

Lily steadied herself, clutching her mace. The witch must have sensed her tensing up, as it let out an unearthly shriek, and waves of familiars came gushing forth. Lily set up portals around herself. They acted not only as barriers, but sent the familiars back into the crowd while she dealt with others. Lily wasn't going to let a familiar get the jump on her a second time, continuously pivoting and closing and opening portals around her, slicing to pieces any familiars who were caught in between a portal as it closed.

The strategy seemed to be working. The familiars weren't able to physically injure here unless they overwhelmed her, and by keeping on her foot and constantly moving she made them unable to so much as scratch her. This didn't add up. What was the point of sending a crowd of familiars with no way to damage your opponent?

The question popped into Lily's head too late, as she felt a massive shock wave hit her. Falling to the ground, she barely saw out of the corner of her eye the bell chiming. _So she's trying to incapacitate me so I don't put up any resistance when she's ready to kill me._

The familiars were almost on top of her. Lily threw a portal to her side and rolled through it, coming out outside of the mob.

_Big mistake. You already pissed me off plenty with the paintings and flashbacks. You want me mad, you got me mad._

As the familiars swarmed toward her, Lily put up a large portal in front of her, with the exit on the roof. Over half the crowd got through it before they started going around. Lily closed the entrance, killing only a few with the closing slash, and put a new entrance a few meters directly below the portal on the roof. _That's a good portion of the mob occupied while I clean up the remainders._

Lily returned to bashing the familiars into pieces. But as she happened to turn towards the witch to slap a familiar with the head of her weapon, she saw it raising it's scissor arm, ready to come down on her.

_Oh shit_.

Lily ducked into a portal as the giant blades came down on where she had been standing moments ago. Not giving her a chance to breathe, the with followed up, as one of it's hands that was in the ground came out and lunged for her. Lily jumped away, batting familiars back with her mace as she went.

_Not trying to incapacitate me? Hoping you can land some solid hits on me? Wrong move, mate._ Lily pulled up two portals, and jetted through, past the mob. _That mirror ...is that the core? It feels like a trap, but I can't think of anywhere else it's weak spot would be…_

Lily ran for the mirror, mace at the ready. The rock-like hand clenching the bell slammed into the ground, creating a loud _ka-clang_. The witch shuddered as it released it's grip on the roof and dropped down so that Lily was facing the mirror.

_No better opportunity, I guess._

Lily threw her arms back, ready to swing, when the witch s_hrieked_. A hideous, awful shriek, and as Lily neared the mirror, pushing past the pain in her ears, the ringing in her head at it's peak, she saw herself in the mirror.

She wasn't a Magical Girl. Her family faded in and out of the background. Money was scattered on the ground, as if it wasting it meant nothing. The loan sharks came, and they obeyed every order given to them.

Her family was happy. _She was happy._

Lily could only stare at her ideal life, paralyzed. She didn't move to resist as a hand grabbed her, and slammed her against the mirror. She didn't feel the pain. She focused only on the fact that she had moved closer to this display of ideal perfection for herself. She did not notice as the scissor hand rose, poised to strike.

The mirror image changed. The happiness Lily had in this life was gone, swept away. Her lowest points were sown. It was as if all the worst outcomes from the paintings were combined. Lily saw herself, broken, battered, torn withered. She saw all the witches she had killed, and what they were like as Magical Girls, how they suffered, and how she mercilessly killed them. Lily's happiness had been torn away.

_**YOU WILL NEVER BE HAPPY. YOU DON'T DESERVE TO BE HAPPY.**_

Lily could only shed a single tear as the scissor hand plunged towards her.


End file.
